After six long years, we finally made it back to the Solomon Islands. When we were there last in 2006, I didn't know if I would ever be back again. It's an expensive destination, and we wanted to try going to some different areas. But when I had to say goodbye to my special coral hermit crab friends at Mirror Pond, I cried as I ascended to the tender.

I've since found coral hermit crab friends in other places, most especially Raja Ampat. But Mirror Pond was special indeed, in the numbers and variety of these crabs and the corals that they live in. Other reasons I wanted to return to the Solomons included all the macro critters in the Florida and Russell Islands, the sharks on the walls at Marovo, and of course, Mary Island, for huge schools of jacks and barracuda, sharks, dartfish and freckle face blennies. What more could I want? Well, maybe schools of mantas at Devil's Highway, where I'd never been?

So yes, we made it back and had a wonderful trip on the oh-so comfortable Bilikiki. We spent Christmas in the village of Karumolun with islanders doing a special show of music and dances for us. And then a memorable New Year's Eve on the boat with our own dance party, powered by ipods. "And I would walk 500 miles, and I would walk 500 more!" The weather could have been better and I could have gotten more photos, but I loved being in the Solomons once more. A Solomons finale for me? Who knows what the future will bring!

There is an extended gallery, and a short selects gallery. My suggestion is to explore the selects gallery. There is a slideshow in three formats, one for PC (exe), one for Mac (App) and a streaming video (HTML5) so you can choose how you'd like to view it.